Have you been looking for a New Year Challenge? Do you want to support a great, small charity? Then we have the opportunity for you!

Once again, Kipawa has places in the fantastic 'Ride London' cycling event which takes place on 29th July 2018 and covers 100 miles from the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, through the Surrey countryside on closed roads, to Central London, finishing at Buckingham Palace. You may remember the course from the 2012 London Olympics?

Participants who have ridden for us in the past have spoken of the amazing atmosphere and the wonderful sense of achievement at the end. One participant commented that cycling the finish, down The Mall like Bradley Wiggins in the Olympics, with all the crowds cheering, was a particular thrill!

All we ask from you for the chance to take part in this great event is a committment to raise a minimum of £750 in fundraising. Of course we can give you any assistance you need with your fundraising (the cycling training will be down to you!) Why not ask your friends or colleagues if they would like to make up a team and you could share the fundraising and support each other with the training?

We are more than happy to answer any questions you have - just contact us now! Places are limited, so get in touch soon to confirm your place.

Another busy day, full-on out visiting our projects from 9am through to 7pm today.

Much of it was spent at Oaklands Primary School, which we’ve only been supporting since 2016. It was my first trip there and it was quite an experience. The school sits on a coffee plantation – the land was given to the Government by the owners of the plantation to build a school, which teaches children of the people who work there. The school is surrounded by acres and acres of well-tended coffee plants, punctuated occasionally by small groups of tiny houses in which these families live.

But the situation is far from idyllic. What is already hard work (paying about 300 shillings a day, about £2.20) has been made more difficult by ownership changes, resulting in mass lay-offs and re-employment on casual contracts. Workers are not guaranteed wages throughout the year, or even during the three coffee harvests a year. And when they don’t get work, or seek it elsewhere, they lose access to the houses they in. I was taken to meet one of these workers today, a single mother of five who has a child at the school. She works on the plantation with a nine-month old baby strapped to her back – scared of losing her job and her house.

All of this has had an impact on the children at the school in the past few years too, with absence rates being very high and the performance of the kids attending being below average. Thankfully, the work Kipawa is doing here is making a big difference.

I met with the headteacher Joseph this morning who couldn’t have given more praise for what our donors have achieved here. His clear view is that the food programme (we are doing breakfast porridge and lunch for all the kids at Oaklands) has delivered “a drastic change in performance: for example, there is no absenteeism any more. Two years ago, there were sometimes up to 100 absentees every day, but now it is more likely a handful. And that’s because there is food available”. He also thinks that the KCPE performance will improve this year – from an average of 215 to 250 – and that is because the children are better able to concentrate. Our social workers there – Mary and Moses – agree. They’ve noticed a change in behaviour since the feeding programmes started; kids are no longer lethargic and sleepy but energetic and motivated all day.

We are making improvements to the facilities too. I saw the final stages of the new girls toilet block today, with a solid watertight building in place with proper latrines and a very deep pit. This is not only safer and healthier (for disease prevention) but more dignified too. What was also interesting is that the Government had started building a new boys toilet block earlier this year: but it remains uncompleted on the site, with no reason given for its current state.

The toilet block built by Kipawa

The unfinished toilet block, started by the government.

At the end of my time there at Oaklands, a young girl called Faith spoke on camera on what Kipawa has done for her and her friends. She can speak for herself:

Later in the afternoon, I had lunch with the 15 students Kipawa is sponsoring through a few secondary schools in the Ruiru area. These young people were identified as they left primary school as being able to benefit from secondary school but whose families would likely not support them financially to do so. The money our donors are sending to Kenya is doing two things for these vulnerable kids: ensuring that a lack of fees, uniforms and other equipment isn’t preventing them from attending school regularly; and it provides wrap-around support from case workers like Monicah who works on the secondary school programme. Monicah spends all of her time checking on the welfare and wider environment of these students, intervening where needed.

The kids range in age from 14 through 17, with the oldest five of them due to sit their KCSE exams (the Kenyan Certificate of Secondary Education) throughout October and November. Like teenagers anywhere, they were shy at first but were soon chatting away: They were keen to find out about where I live in Scotland, about education in the UK, and the girls in particular were amazed to hear our Prime Minsiter and First Mininster are both female.

Most importantly, they were enthusiastic about their time at school, their interests and their ambitions for the future. And it was terrific to hear one of them really wants to be a doctor; another wants to study electrical engineering; a couple more think they they’d be good social workers. There was some discussion on the way home tonight about the next steps for some of these kids: certainly, we at Kipawa should be thinking about if and how we can continue to support some of these young people should they move into colleges and university.

I have few more trips planned for tomorrow, including going back to Mukuyu School to hand out some new books, footballs, toys and other things. These were purchased today using money donated in a recent appeal. You can still donate to the appeal here:http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/DavidWelsh

Many thanks to Reuben and Phoebe (both under 5 years old!) who have been saving all the 20ps from their pocket money for the last few months to fill up their Smartie tubes for Kipawa. Their generosity will feed a child in one of our schools lunch for a whole school year or allow 120 children to receive deworming medication! THANK YOU and Happy Christmas!

Did you know that today - Saturday 19th November 2016 - is World Toilet Day? You may not even have been aware that there was a World Toilet Day? However, the lack of toilets and decent sanitation in Kenya and in other countries across the world, is a very serious health issue.

We have been so pleased in 2016 to have begun working with a second primary school in the Ruiru area - Oaklands School. Oaklands School is a more rural school than Mukuyu and is on a coffee plantation. The school's buildings and facilities are in a fairly run-down state, much like Mukuyu was five years ago.

The toilets are in such a bad state - the back wall has collapsed - that they can't be used. This means that the children have to use the bush, which is unsanitary and, particularly for the girls, unsafe.

How can you help?

This Christmas we would love to give the gift of new, safe toilets to the children at Oaklands School - and what better day to kickstart our Christmas Appeal than on World Toilet Day? It will cost around £7,500 to build two new toilet blocks for the girls and boys at Oaklands School but whatever little you can give will go a long way to helping.

Kipawa's Christmas Appeal this year is raising funds to support a new 'Kickstarter class' in Mukuyu School.

A Kickstarter class is designed to help reintegrate kids that have missed large parts of their schooling back into the school environment. These are often the children who are least well-off and who will benefit most from the smaller class size, social work support and focussed intervention to Kickstart their education.

So far, we are delighted to say we have managed to raise £2,046.25 – over 80% of the total of £2,500 needed to set up the class! Thank you so much to everyone who has contributed so far.

We know it's an expensive time of year for many of you, but please support us if you can – whatever you can give will really make a difference to the lives of all the children that get a second chance at an education.